Neopets
On the horse's back was a human-like creature with pointed ears and a sharp face – but unshaded and therefore oddly unreal on the horse. As if the artist knew what it generally looked like but had to use her mind to fill in the details – and then somehow knew that they weren't right.
"Another elf?" Shirley, who sat next to her, grinned as Rae's blank, unseeing expression seemed to jump into focus. Rae the dreamer, who could quietly read a book and not notice even when the teacher walked in.
Rae nodded, waiting for the inevitable question.
"Why do you like drawing horses and... elves?" Shirley inquired, as if she had difficulty pronouncing the last word.
Rae could almost see the sentence in her mind: Elf = Christmas elf = Small thing with pointed ears that gives out prezzies = Employed saleswomen in absurdly short skirts.
"Because I like to." Rae grinned.
"Dragons and unicorns and this – you like fantasy, don't you?" Shirley said. Rae glanced at the Tom Clancy novel on Shirley's cluttered desk, and knew she wouldn't understand.
"Well, yes," Rae grinned. Fantasy – here where thrillers with authors like John Grisham and Michael Crichton were so popular, high fantasy was Harry Potter. Or worse, Brother's Grimm's Snow White and the Seven bloody Dwarves, or Enid Blyton.
Where dragons were either scaly things with bat wings that breathed fire, or the long, snakelike, lucky chinese ones. Where unicorns were just a vague part of Chinese proverbs. Where elves were silly creatures that wore hats with bobbles on.
Not in Rae's mind, but therein was the frustration – sometimes she got a clear image and just wasn't in the mood for capturing it, or she was in the mood and couldn't think of anything at all.
"Oh." Shirley said vaguely. "You read a lot." And Rae did – she made it a point to read (or eat up, as her mother put it), at least one book a week. It kept her mind going.
"Yep," Rae said, and got back to doodling grass under the horse's prancing hooves.
"Say, can you draw a bird on my file? Just a small one." Shirley said, after watching Rae for a few seconds.
"Sure," Rae sighed, and Shirley reached for her file with the Samurai X logo. Everyone asked her to do this sooner or later. If not a bird, a 'cute puppy', or a cat, or a mouse. No horses, no elves, no dragons.
"She's coming," Jennifer, the girl who sat next to the back door of the classroom, announced. There was a small flurry of activity as everyone hurried back to their desks, and an angelic silence descended on the class.
Mrs Norris walked in. Her inscrutable blue eyes swept over the class, like a general surveying his troops. Called 'old battle-axe' behind her back, she certainly seemed to deserve the nickname, hatchet faced, ice-blue eyes with a manner nearly as cold during school time. After school she was reputed to be a warm, friendly lady, but Rae wanted to see that before she believed it.
Shirley and Rae forgot about the bird when the small-sized but grim – looking teacher spoke up.
"It is now Contact time," Mrs Norris said sourly. Contact time was the time between the end of assembly and the beginning of the first class, for a form teacher of a class to speak to the class. Mrs Norris always appeared to think it was a waste of time.
"You are all to think of four Core values that this class should... have. Like dignity..." Mrs Norris' stare turned to Linda, who quickly straightened from her habitual slouch in her chair, "Neatness..." her blue stare took in Willow, whose desk was not so much a desk as a mass of paper with occasional patches of table. Willow automatically tried to clear up some bits.
"And I want to see Rae." She strode to the teacher's table and sat down.
Rae looked helplessly at her friends sitting around her, swallowed, and got up to walk to the table.
***
"But the girl should have a lot of people who know her..." Teriwaz began.
"The spell is a powerful one," his father cut in. "Trust in the World-Maker."
Teriwaz looked glumly around him. He had been teleported back to Feyraen, in the island stronghold of LanC'edar, probably setting off quite a few alarm bells in the Warrior School.
Zaknafein is going to flip when I don't show up for evening class, Teriwaz thought gloomily. He's going to do worse than Nassar.
The Sword Master was notoriously strict with attendance... and playing truant... well, no one had ever done that before when he came to be Master. Not after one incident still whispered around corners to frighten students.
"Teriwaz LanC'edar," his father said sharply, "Are you listening?"
Teriwaz looked up to his sire, and saw an elf more heavily built than himself. I could probably get in a first swing, he thought, but after that he'd kill me, son or no son.
"Why not Uruz?" he asked, saying the name of his older brother, "I mean, he's graduated..."
"Uruz is mated," his father snapped. "It may interfere with the Nexus bond, as his mate is not his Nexus."
Oh. How obvious.
"Othila?" Teriwaz was grasping at straws and he knew it. Othila the youngest brother had just started in Sanctuary as a SkyKnight, dashing, witty and absolutely could not be serious about anything – quintessal SkyKnight attributes. SkyKnights were either creatures that could fly or humanoids that took Aesthir, a sentient Pegasus charger, as a steed. They were designed to fight in the air, and were more or less useless on the ground.
"SkyKnights usually don't marry," his father said coldly, but Teiwaz knew the real reason: Othila was more or less estranged from LanC'edar, as in his father's words, "Only damned Moon elves want to fly."
"All right, all right," Teiwaz said moodily, "It's just that I still think I'm too... too..."
"Young?" his father finished, "Yes, you are. But you can learn."
How comforting, Teiwaz sighed. Especially if this kills me.
"What was the deal?" Teiwaz inquired mildly.
His father stopped his pacing. "Just that – a deal. None of your business."
Teiwaz made a note to find out exactly what the 'business' was.
"Are you ready?" his father asked.
"No." Teiwaz said absently before realizing he had spoken aloud. Oops.
His father turned a diamond-hard glare on him. "Be ready."
***
"Did you hand in your report book?" Mrs Norris asked.
"Yes," Rae said. A small, dim panic was beginning. She did remember handing in the gray, thin book – the book that recorded all the grades and information of her four years in secondary school. What had happened to it?
"Go home and look for it. It's not with me." Mrs Norris said curtly. Rae was almost relieved when the class secretary, Virginia, glanced at her from her desk nearly against the teacher's table.
"I saw her book," Virginia said clearly.
Mrs Norris looked at Virginia. "I'd go and search again," she said grudgingly, "But go home and look. Put it in my locker if you find it." The message was, when you find it.
***
"How do I know which is my Nexus?" Teiwaz asked.
"You will – once you see her," was the enigmatic reply from the family Loremaster.
Great. Teiwaz sighed.
His father turned his stare on him again. "If you don't find the girl," he said suddenly, "You don't come back."
Teiwaz sank more deeply into his seat.
***
The first thing Rae did when she got home was to sift through the shelf containing all her schoolbooks.
Then she went on to the shelves with her beloved storybooks. Half an hour later, many of those books were lying forgotten on the floor.
Where is it, where is it?
She couldn't have lost it. All four years... with no record of her grades anywhere... she was in deep trouble.
***
"Did you manage to find it?" Mrs Norris asked the next day.
"No." Rae said. A tightness in her eyes, and she felt like crying, but bit her lip quickly. She wasn't about to start bawling now.
"Buy a new book," Mrs Norris said brusquely, "I'd try and print out your records tomorrow."
***
"Everything's finishing soon," Teiwaz's father said with satisfaction. "You go into the world, fetch the girl, tell her about what's happening, then come out when we open a gateway for you."
Teiwaz swallowed, and fingered his scabbards. No way out.
***
"There aren't any computer records for the years," Mrs Norris looked slightly puzzled. "What were the names of your form teachers?"
"Mrs Nar... and Miss Logary for secondary two and three." Rae said. This couldn't be happening.
"Miss Logary transferred to Burdock Convent last year," Mrs Norris murmured, "And Mrs Nar has gone overseas."
When Rae walked back to her desk, she met the eyes of Felicity, who had heard what they'd been saying. "Unlucky," the girl commented.
That, Rae thought, summarized the entire situation perfectly. She felt numb with astonishment and more than a little fear.
"I'm sure you'd find it," Shirley said encouragingly, "I mean, maybe you left it on your study table or something."
I don't have a study table. Rae felt like saying, but then decided not to.
Chemistry class breezed through until it was time for recess.
***
"Be careful," his mother admonished him.
"Yes mother," Teiwaz sighed. She'd said approximately the same thing when he was going to Sanctuary with Othila.
Berkana looked quickly to his father, and noted that he was absorbed in the conversation with LanC'edar's sorcerer and Wordmage. That suggested some 'suspects' for which World-Maker...
"Why don't you want to do it?" she asked softly, "I thought you'd want to find your Nexus." Nexus pairs were scattered around the universe, not necessarily in the same dimension, either. This was, in one light, a very big chance.
"I want to graduate." Teiwaz said. I want to finish being a warrior.
"You will," Berkana promised, "As a Loremaster Talent."
Teiwaz mumbled something under his breath. He didn't look forward to jumping around worlds, yet. He hadn't even gotten his degree in parry yet...
"Are you ready?" his father approached, stern face emotionlessly suggesting that Teiwaz had better be.
"Yes." Teiwaz said, lowering his head, the picture of misery. Behind his back he crossed his fingers, a childish gesture, perhaps, but still one of small defiance.
"Good." His father motioned for the magic users to step forward.
***
Rae had always counted the seconds to recess, especially during a boring class. Today, she felt that it had seemed to come so fast.
"Your homework for today is written on the board," Mrs Davis was saying, "Copy it down, no need to write the question. Hand it in to Jenny tomorrow."
The bell rang, and the lethargic class exploded into motion with an excited chatter.
***
Teiwaz leant against a whitewashed wall to try and get his bearings and fight off the dizziness. The new building was blocky and ugly compared to the LanC'edar castle or any architecture in Sanctuary. The walls were painted white throughout with no hint of tapestry or art to soften it, only with the odd, dog-eared poster stuck half-heartedly on.
The ground was some sort of material he hadn't seen before – gray and uncomfortable to touch and hard. And very ugly – it didn't have an even color at all.
The staircase behind him, Teiwaz noted with a certain tired horror, had walls painted a bright yellow. The steps, instead of marble or carpeted slate or polished wood, were of the same, ugly gray material.
He walked over to the closest railing – a deep green metal bar thicker than his arm, stuck between two pillars a few inches above a lower wall that could be looked easily over – and looked down. He was about three stories up, lower than LanC'edar castle. Which meant that he had purposely been dumped on this level.
The building was too large to search himself, anyway. From here he could see other blocks and places, especially the large semicircular amphitheater below him, with the platform in front and the two flagpoles. Two flags flew in the dying wind, and Teiwaz was suddenly aware of the hot, hot sun.
How do they survive in this weather? Was his first thought. It seemed as hot as the Great Desert. He was used to cool Sanctuary or the mist-blown gold elf territory. Not this.
He looked around the corridor he was on, and noticed several doors leading to rooms in front of him. Each room had a set of lockers outside, also painted alternatively in bright colors or a dull gray. Teiwaz suddenly understood vaguely what place he was actually in. Those rooms were like classrooms, though much, much smaller than Sword Hall. Therefore, he was in a...
A school.
Voices were coming from some of the classrooms, as if someone was 'teaching'. He understood partly – the language was like a mangled dialect of elvish, heavy with slang. He couldn't make out what was being taught, though.
There was a big, red colored metal half-sphere in the top corner where the ceiling met the wall, close to the first classroom on the corridor. Teiwaz looked curiously at it. A security system?
Abruptly the half-sphere erupted into a cacophony of harsh, ringing sound. Teiwaz nearly jumped off the corridor.
Then there was the sound of many people putting their books and stuff down on tables and standing up. Uh-oh.
A human woman walked out of the classroom before Teiwaz could find a place to hide. At first he was astonished when she walked right past him without seeing, then relieved when he remembered that his father had given him a specific dweomer of invisibility. The people would see him, but their minds wouldn't register it on any higher level other than automatically moving around him if he was in the way. His Nexus would be the only one who'd be able to see him – another easy way to find her.
Human younglings poured out of the classrooms, wearing odd-looking clothing, all of the same color. Uniforms, he realized. These were students. They too, walked past him without seeing him.
All girls, his mind registered slowly. Maybe this was a school for 'witches', a term for female magic-users. They weren't a School yet in Sanctuary, but may well be soon, when a World-Maker adopted the all-female group that was rumored to be big.
They all seemed to be heading somewhere. Good. Teiwaz thought. Maybe she'd pass with them, too.
Then his mind belatedly registered something else. All of them are humans.
Oh, great. Was his Nexus human, too? He didn't want to be tied to a human – yeah, well many of the Masters were humans, and elves weren't exactly superior etc, but th
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